Associated Harvest

Associated Harvest, run by company presidents Glenn and Coleen Walldroff (p: 315-658-2926), is a company located in Lafargeville, NY that manufactures wood pellets. Their pellets are made from wood fiber that comes from six to eight different furniture milling operations within a 200 mile radius of the facility. Their equipment puts out about five tons of pellets an hour, and consists of (all prices approximate): a $40,000 grinder, a $50-60,000 loader, $50-60,000 of conveying equipment, a $300,000 Andritz pelletizer, a $100,000 generator, a $150,000 packing line, and $150,000 in other miscellaneous equipment. The company also spent $50-60,000 on trucks and $500-600,000 on buildings. There is about a $5-6,000 a year maintenance cost on the generator, which produces all the electricity for the plant to run, and various additional maintenance costs on the rest of the equipment.

The company, which has been running for 22 years, spends from $40-70 a ton on raw material, and sells the finish product for $190-250 a ton. They ship their pellets throughout New York State, where they are used mainly for home heating purposes. Glenn Walldroff reports that it has been more difficult in recent years getting materials, as secondary wood use sales are down.

Associated Harvest has also been engaging in experimentation of grass pellet production for the last year. Though it is still very much in the experimental stages at the moment, Waldroff says that they have given a lot of thought and consideration to producing grass pellets commercially in the near future. So far they have been using mixed native grasses, and trying out the process on the equipment they already have.